


Out of Place

by kaylee_wolf



Category: The Walking Dead (Telltale Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Background characters - Freeform, F/M, Gen, Mitch Lives (Walking Dead: Done Running), Post-Game(s), cj this is because of you
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:34:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,747
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26590729
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaylee_wolf/pseuds/kaylee_wolf
Summary: Kenny finds his way to West Virginia with a caravan and runs into a familiar face or two.
Relationships: AJ | Alvin Jr. & Clementine & Kenny (Walking Dead), AJ | Alvin Jr. & Clementine (Walking Dead), Clementine & Kenny (Walking Dead), Clementine/Louis (Walking Dead: Done Running), James (Walking Dead: Suffer The Children)/Mitch (Walking Dead: Done Running), Kenny & AJ | Alvin Jr. (Walking Dead), Kenny & Louis (Walking Dead: Done Running)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 10





	Out of Place

Kenny didn't know how he was still alive. Most of the years had been slow, full of starvation and sickness, and tiring. But there he was in the middle of spring, twelve years after the apocalypse began. He knew what state he was in, though. Traveling along the highways ensured that. West Virginia. He'd been there a few times, only overnight. And now, he and the caravan would be here for at least a few weeks.

They walked along a river for now. It was clean water if someone needed it and made it so they could be a bit louder than usual. Eventually, one of the caravan hands, Jerry, pointed out a boat in the distance. It was cracked open like an egg, torn apart and destroyed. Kenny was more surprised than anything. Something of that size would've needed a pretty big blow to destroy it.

They catch up to it and see an array of corpses; some walkers and some humans. The walker ones were expected, but then Kenny saw a familiar face - er, a familiar torso and head - laying on the ground. Lilly, from the Everett Pharmacy Drugstore. He didn't know why he still remembered the name so clearly. Maybe it was because it reminded him of Lee, his old friend who would be angry at the choices he made.

"That's... brutal," Jerry said, cringing as he nudged Lilly's head with his foot. "But I guess the explosion didn't do that to her face."

Kenny had to hold back tears for the first time in years. "Musta been a person," he whispered.

"You know this chick or somethin'?"

He nodded. "Long time ago. Not really important."

"If you say so." Jerry knew not to push, so did the others.

And suddenly, they were caught off guard. Three boys, two teenagers and one younger one, approached, no weapons drawn. The kid had a bow hanging over his shoulder and gaps in his teeth, the taller one had a knife slipped into his pocket, and the final one just had a suspicious look on his face. Kenny almost drew his weapon before the tall one spoke.

"You guys got shit to trade?"

It was said kind of harshly and the suspicious one nudged him with an elbow. "We do," Jerry said.

"Aight, follow us. We have warm meals and shit to trade."

The suspicious one shook his head before the kids turned around and expected the caravan to follow. To be fair, they did. At one point, the younger one turned around. "My name is Willy. That's James and Mitch." Each kid waved as their name was said as if it was nature. Then Willy turned back around as if nothing happened.

The three were lost in their own conversation until James raised his hand to stop everyone and raised a finger to his lips. He took a rock from the ground beside him and threw it at a tree. It seemed to be unnecessary at first, but then a walker came out of the bushes to follow the sound. Then he motioned for them to move again and acted as if nothing happened.

"Why didn't you kill it?" Kenny asked.

James glanced back. "It wasn't bothering us."

He stayed silent. They reached the gates of a school a few minutes later. There was a little kid standing on a parapet of some kind and he leaped down from his place to open the creaking metal gates. There was just curiosity at first, seeing as these kids had been surviving like this for so long. But then he saw a face he was sure he would never see again.

Clementine.

She was smiling. He noticed that before her missing leg. But he hadn't seen her smile in so long, not even when he was still with the cabin group. And then he saw the crutches, which led to seeing the missing limb. Tears fell down his cheeks before he even knew what to do with himself. His hands planted themselves on his face and a few sobs racked his chest. He hadn't been noticed yet, but he still broke down.

And when she did finally see him, an expression of fear painted her face and she hid the kid that was on the parapet behind herself. She said something to the boy beside her and he took the kid away, leaving a crippled Clementine standing there with a fearful look. She eventually started forward toward Kenny, cautious with every movement. The tall kid, Mitch stopped her partway through.

"Clem, you okay?"

She nodded slowly, her eyes never leaving the man in the middle of a breakdown. "Could you, uh, stay close?"

"'Course." He could take the hint that she was a bit afraid. He didn't understand why, but that didn't matter.

After a few steps forward, she was face to face with Kenny after six years? Maybe seven? She was nauseous and swallowed the lump in her throat. "You're still alive?"

"Yeah," he croaked out, a stray tear falling to the ground. He reached out, but she flinched.

All the memories of his anger came flooding back at every slight movement of his. "You should leave," she mumbled, carefully backing away before turning around with her friend following.

And now Kenny was even more broken down.

~~~~~

The caravan stayed overnight. And the next morning, Kenny could tell Clementine was avoiding him. He had figured out the kid on the parapet was AJ and had a whole other break down over it. He was simply upset at the world.

He made an effort to talk to her, though. He apologized for how he acted in the past and promised that he wanted to do better. And he really did. So she offered something for him to prove himself. An introduction to her boyfriend.

He wanted to feel absolutely livid at the prospect of it, but he realized that she would be considered an adult now. Plus, she'd been on her own for a little over half a dozen years. There was a lot he'd missed, evidently. AJ was growing up, Clementine was dating (plus lost a leg and a finger), and there was a thriving community of kids living in a school.

Her boyfriend seemed nice. Kenny learned that his name was Louis and that he liked three things: playing piano, his family (which he made clear was Clementine and AJ), and being happy. He found that to be... charming if nothing else. He still didn't like the fact Clementine was in a romantic relationship at all, but he was going to prove he would be better. Regardless of his actual feelings.

However, later that night, he saw them acting lovey-dovey. It made him ridiculously angry. Maybe he was too used to life on the road, but Clementine having her guard down made him anxious. He wanted to go over there and scream his head off at Louis for making Clem have her walls down. But he didn't. Instead, he held it in. But seeing it still made the anger bubble in his stomach.

And then, there was the piano incident.

~~~~~

It was a couple nights later, the night before the caravan was going to leave, that he caught Louis playing something in the music room. Maybe it was something about the off-tune piano or maybe it was just that he was annoyed that this kid was the one making Clem smile like he'd never seen. Either way, catching him alone like that was both a blessing and a curse.

On one hand, he wanted to talk to the kid. On the other, he still wanted to deck this kid in the mouth.

"So... Louis, right?" he asked at first. He was remaining calm.

Louis turned in his seat and smiled nervously. "The one and only, my good sir. What can I do for you?"

"Can we talk about Clementine?"

The kid turned serious. That wasn't something Kenny had seen yet. "Did something happen?"

"No, just..." He genuinely hesitated to say anything. "You're putting her in danger."

And then the kid laughed. _Laughed_. Kenny couldn't believe it as the anger grew. "Truth be told, dude, I think her missing leg," he said as he motioned toward his own leg, "does just that."

"You fuckin' brat!" Kenny started harshly. This was the first time he had raised his voice while at the school and it spooked Louis. "She's already missing her goddamn leg and you want to sit here and say that she's in danger no matter what?! You know what, fuck you! She's not allowed to see you anymore. I'll make sure of it!"

Kenny didn't expect that the kid would rise against him. "Who are you to think you can do that? You know what she's said about you, right? You scared the shit out of her when she was just a little kid and now you expect all that to go away with a fucking _apology_?!"

"Excuse-"

Louis was louder than he expected. "It's hard enough to even believe that she actually loves me back and you're going to sit here and say that I'm putting her in danger?! I told you from the gate that I care about them more than anything! It's bad enough to see you here after what Clem told us about you, but we do _not_ need you butting into our lives!"

Kenny was speechless for a moment. And then the threats came. Louis challenged him to actually do something and he raised his fist. It was at that moment he heard a little scream for the kid in front of him. The moment after had AJ in his sight, aiming a revolver at his head. "Don't even think about touching him," the kid threatened, finger on the trigger and everything.

Clementine turned the corner. "What the hell happened here? AJ, what are you doing-"

"He was going to hurt Louis!"

Her face fell, and Kenny could tell her stomach was doing flips from how sick she looked. She took a few steps forward, making her way to stand beside Louis as AJ lowered the gun. She took a deep breath before she lost her shit. Kenny certainly didn't expect that. "Louis has been nicer to me than anyone else in a long fucking time! You aren't going to walk all over him because you don't like him! You're leaving as soon as morning comes, with or without the caravan."

**Author's Note:**

> If he leaves or not is up to your imagination and no I'm not revising this. my brain hurts :')


End file.
